By Vicente Arenas | Fox31
AURORA, Colo. (KDVR) — A group of people marched late Monday to the GEO Group’s contract holding facility in Aurora, contracted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, to show their solidarity with ICE protests in Los Angeles.
Several groups called for people to gather for what they called an emergency march and protest. The organizations made their way to the GEO ICE facility, a little less than a mile from the march’s starting point.
That’s where they held a vigil for immigrants who have been detained, including activist Jeanette Vizguerra. Several different Colorado organizations say they want to call attention to the immigrants being detained in Los Angeles. Araseli, an Aurora resident, said her husband is detained in the ICE facility.
“Currently, my husband is detained right here in the jail detention center, after he was riding his bike on April 23, down our block from our house, they detained him only because they said he had a deportation,” she told FOX31’s Hanna Powers.
There have been violent clashes between protestors and ICE agents in California.
A spokesperson for the group here in Colorado says they fear the number of deportations taking place in Colorado will increase as well.
They are hoping their march on Monday sends out a message that is loud and clear.
“We also want to show solidarity with what is happening in LA. We’re seeing is that people are not accepting the violent disappearance of their neighbors and neither are we here in Colorado. That’s something we are not going to stand for,” Housekeys Action Network Denver Member V Reeves said.
FOX31 received a lengthy statement from ICE regarding Monday’s protest.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is in a unique position to enforce immigration laws of the United States in the nation’s interior with its broad investigatory authorities and law enforcement capabilities. As part of its routine operations, ICE arrests aliens who commit crimes and other individuals who have violated our nation’s immigration laws. All aliens in violation of U.S. immigration law may be subject to arrest, detention and if found removable by final order, removed from the U.S., regardless of nationality.
U.S. immigration laws allow aliens to pursue relief from removal; however, once they have exhausted all due process and appeals, the aliens remain subject to a final order of removal from an immigration judge and ICE must carry out that order.
ICE respects the constitutional right of people to peacefully protest; however, assaulting, resisting, impeding or hharassing ICE officers and special agents or interfering in any way as they are executing their official duty is against the law. If any person assaults a federal law enforcement officer, they risk being prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
ICE Spokesperson